NJPW King of Pro Wrestling 2014
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NJPW King of Pro Wrestling 2014 (10/13/2014)- Tokyo, Japan
YUJI NAGATA, TOMOAKI HONMA, TOGI MAKABE, & KOTA IBUSHI vs. THE BULLET CLUB (Bad Luck Fale, Tama Tonga, Doc Gallows, & Karl â€"Machine Gun†Anderson)- 5.75/10
A decent opener, but not much else really going on (aside from that lariat you’ll know the one I’m talking about when you see it).
NWA WORLD JR. HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: Chase Owens(c) (w/Bruce Tharpe) vs. Bushi- 6.25/10
Owens jumped Bushi from behind, so he is the heel here. The match was good. Owens looked impressive. MUCH better than the usual guys we get form the NWA.
POST-MATCH SEGMENT- good.
Bruce Tharpe cut a promo saying that he and Owens wanted a â€"real challenger.†They wanted Jushin â€"Thunder†Liger! Tharpe said they would take Liger’s mask. Liger came out, told Tharpe to shut up, then cut a promo putting over Owens, accepting the challenge, and saying that he will win the title, all in much better English than I was assuming he had. The crowd went nuts for this.
NWA WORLD TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Satoshi Kojima vs. K.E.S. (Davey Boy Smith Jr. & Lance Archer) (w/TAKA Michinoku)- 6.75/10
They had a good match, but it was a little slow in the beginning. Ten-Koji had a miscue which led to the K.E.S. taking over the match and eventually winning. Bruce Tharpe was extremely pleased that the North Americans had won the titles. Kojima and Tenzan had a shoving match after the match, and left separately.
KAZUSHI SAKURABA & TORU YANO vs. SUZUKI-GUN (w/Minoru Suzuki & Takashi Iizuka) (w/TAKA Michinoku)- DUD!
They did the same sh*t they always do, except this time even Sakuraba and Suzuki did an idiotic spot, too. So they do this spot where Sakuraba is kicking Suzuki’s ass in the corner and he just won’t stop. To the point where the ref tries to pull him off, but he won’t stop. Even his own partner tried to pull him off, and it took both him and the ref to pull Sakuraba off. Why was this not a DQ?
Anyway, if you’ve seen one of their matches (and G-d knows there have been WAY too many of them), you’ve seen them all. At this point I think it has surpassed Mr. Anderson vs. Samuel Shaw as the Worst Feud of the Year (though if it has a good blow-off, I might change my mind).
After the match, Sakuraba and Suzuki grappled on the floor and it was great, as usual. I assume they’ll be facing off at the Tokyo Dome. Every day that I have to sit through these sh*tty tag matches with Yano and Iizuka instead of the singles match I want to see makes me hate the world.
IWGP JR. HEAVYWEIGHT TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: Time Splitters(c) vs. Forever Hooligans vs. The Young Bucks- 8.75/10
An AWESOME match. They told a great story with Shelley playing the babyface in peril for the first half of the match. After that the action really picked up with tons of great, fast-paced spots that built very well from one to the next. There was one EXTREMELY scary spot where Alex Koslov went for a dive but caught his foot on the rope and landed right on his neck on the apron. He seems to be totally okay, though.
IWGP JR. HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: Ryusuke Taguchi(c) vs. El Desperado (w/Suzuki-Gun)- 8/10
So TAKA Michinoku comes out… and he’s got TWO El Desperados! One of them moves to face off against Taguchi… and of course the other one jumps him from behind. The one who distracted Taguchi took of his mask, revealing himself to be wrestling most dickish heel, Taichi. TAKA and Taichi distracted the ref while El Desperado hit Taguchi with the IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Title belt.
The match continued similarly, with Desperado just beating the sh*t out of Taguchi- and when he wasn’t doing that, he was distracting the ref so that TAKA and Taichi could beat the sh*t out of Taguchi. It took at least five minutes for Taguchi to hit his first offensive move. He took tons of punishment, especially to the neck, but he kept on fighting. TAKA and Taichi kept interfering and cutting off any momentum Taguchi would build, and all three of them were just FANTASTIC heels. An awesome match.
NEVER OPENWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: Yujiro Takahashi(c) vs. Tomohiro Ishii- 7.75/10
They worked over each other’s heads and necks with lariats and powerbombs. They went a lot longer than I think anyone expected them to, and as a result, there were some very convincing nearfalls at the end.
HIROOKI GOTO & KATSUYORI SHIBATA vs. CHAOS (Shinsuke Nakamura & YOSHI-HASHI)- 7/10
Great match. The stuff between Shibata and Nakamura was a lot more of what I was hoping we would get during their G1 match a few months ago. I’d love to see them face off again at the January 4th Tokyo Dome show.
TOKYO DOME #1 CONTENDERSHIP CONTRACT MATCH: Kazuchika Okada(c) (w/Gedo) vs. Tetsuya Naito- 8/10
They had an awesome match with both guys working over the other’s head. Naito got the heat and Okada sold it like he was completely groggy and any move to the head might knock him out, and it would have been really good… except that the move that did so much damage to him was a plain old slap to the face. It would have been a lot better if they had used a forearm here instead. Something that would have come off a lot stronger.
The finishing sequence in particular was awesome. In fact basically everything from the Frankensteiner on was awesome (and that was also the most awesome, vicious Frankensteiner I have ever seen).
IWGP HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: AJ Styles(c) (w/Jeff Jarrett) vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi (Captain New Japan)- 8.5/10
A fantastic finishing sequence (although I wasn’t so thrilled with the Ganso Bomb not even leading to a nearfall), but it was nothing special before that, and the overbooking (too many ref bumps, Jeff Jarrett interfering but getting taken out by Yoshi Tatsu) really took me out of it.
Another awesome show from New Japan, but the finish to the main event left me a bit bummed because I thought AJ’s title reign had more steam in it.
YUJI NAGATA, TOMOAKI HONMA, TOGI MAKABE, & KOTA IBUSHI vs. THE BULLET CLUB (Bad Luck Fale, Tama Tonga, Doc Gallows, & Karl â€"Machine Gun†Anderson)- 5.75/10
A decent opener, but not much else really going on (aside from that lariat you’ll know the one I’m talking about when you see it).
NWA WORLD JR. HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: Chase Owens(c) (w/Bruce Tharpe) vs. Bushi- 6.25/10
Owens jumped Bushi from behind, so he is the heel here. The match was good. Owens looked impressive. MUCH better than the usual guys we get form the NWA.
POST-MATCH SEGMENT- good.
Bruce Tharpe cut a promo saying that he and Owens wanted a â€"real challenger.†They wanted Jushin â€"Thunder†Liger! Tharpe said they would take Liger’s mask. Liger came out, told Tharpe to shut up, then cut a promo putting over Owens, accepting the challenge, and saying that he will win the title, all in much better English than I was assuming he had. The crowd went nuts for this.
NWA WORLD TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Satoshi Kojima vs. K.E.S. (Davey Boy Smith Jr. & Lance Archer) (w/TAKA Michinoku)- 6.75/10
They had a good match, but it was a little slow in the beginning. Ten-Koji had a miscue which led to the K.E.S. taking over the match and eventually winning. Bruce Tharpe was extremely pleased that the North Americans had won the titles. Kojima and Tenzan had a shoving match after the match, and left separately.
KAZUSHI SAKURABA & TORU YANO vs. SUZUKI-GUN (w/Minoru Suzuki & Takashi Iizuka) (w/TAKA Michinoku)- DUD!
They did the same sh*t they always do, except this time even Sakuraba and Suzuki did an idiotic spot, too. So they do this spot where Sakuraba is kicking Suzuki’s ass in the corner and he just won’t stop. To the point where the ref tries to pull him off, but he won’t stop. Even his own partner tried to pull him off, and it took both him and the ref to pull Sakuraba off. Why was this not a DQ?
Anyway, if you’ve seen one of their matches (and G-d knows there have been WAY too many of them), you’ve seen them all. At this point I think it has surpassed Mr. Anderson vs. Samuel Shaw as the Worst Feud of the Year (though if it has a good blow-off, I might change my mind).
After the match, Sakuraba and Suzuki grappled on the floor and it was great, as usual. I assume they’ll be facing off at the Tokyo Dome. Every day that I have to sit through these sh*tty tag matches with Yano and Iizuka instead of the singles match I want to see makes me hate the world.
IWGP JR. HEAVYWEIGHT TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: Time Splitters(c) vs. Forever Hooligans vs. The Young Bucks- 8.75/10
An AWESOME match. They told a great story with Shelley playing the babyface in peril for the first half of the match. After that the action really picked up with tons of great, fast-paced spots that built very well from one to the next. There was one EXTREMELY scary spot where Alex Koslov went for a dive but caught his foot on the rope and landed right on his neck on the apron. He seems to be totally okay, though.
IWGP JR. HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: Ryusuke Taguchi(c) vs. El Desperado (w/Suzuki-Gun)- 8/10
So TAKA Michinoku comes out… and he’s got TWO El Desperados! One of them moves to face off against Taguchi… and of course the other one jumps him from behind. The one who distracted Taguchi took of his mask, revealing himself to be wrestling most dickish heel, Taichi. TAKA and Taichi distracted the ref while El Desperado hit Taguchi with the IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Title belt.
The match continued similarly, with Desperado just beating the sh*t out of Taguchi- and when he wasn’t doing that, he was distracting the ref so that TAKA and Taichi could beat the sh*t out of Taguchi. It took at least five minutes for Taguchi to hit his first offensive move. He took tons of punishment, especially to the neck, but he kept on fighting. TAKA and Taichi kept interfering and cutting off any momentum Taguchi would build, and all three of them were just FANTASTIC heels. An awesome match.
NEVER OPENWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: Yujiro Takahashi(c) vs. Tomohiro Ishii- 7.75/10
They worked over each other’s heads and necks with lariats and powerbombs. They went a lot longer than I think anyone expected them to, and as a result, there were some very convincing nearfalls at the end.
HIROOKI GOTO & KATSUYORI SHIBATA vs. CHAOS (Shinsuke Nakamura & YOSHI-HASHI)- 7/10
Great match. The stuff between Shibata and Nakamura was a lot more of what I was hoping we would get during their G1 match a few months ago. I’d love to see them face off again at the January 4th Tokyo Dome show.
TOKYO DOME #1 CONTENDERSHIP CONTRACT MATCH: Kazuchika Okada(c) (w/Gedo) vs. Tetsuya Naito- 8/10
They had an awesome match with both guys working over the other’s head. Naito got the heat and Okada sold it like he was completely groggy and any move to the head might knock him out, and it would have been really good… except that the move that did so much damage to him was a plain old slap to the face. It would have been a lot better if they had used a forearm here instead. Something that would have come off a lot stronger.
The finishing sequence in particular was awesome. In fact basically everything from the Frankensteiner on was awesome (and that was also the most awesome, vicious Frankensteiner I have ever seen).
IWGP HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: AJ Styles(c) (w/Jeff Jarrett) vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi (Captain New Japan)- 8.5/10
A fantastic finishing sequence (although I wasn’t so thrilled with the Ganso Bomb not even leading to a nearfall), but it was nothing special before that, and the overbooking (too many ref bumps, Jeff Jarrett interfering but getting taken out by Yoshi Tatsu) really took me out of it.
Another awesome show from New Japan, but the finish to the main event left me a bit bummed because I thought AJ’s title reign had more steam in it.